If the attitude is "the Russians think that Kharlamov is the best, so he is the best", well, it's hard to argue against it I guess. I still think that in many ways Fetisov, Firsov and Makarov's (and Tretiak's) careers were more impressive and at least in my mind there is, er, reasonable doubt about it. We'll see if there will be any serious arguments in the future, or if it's more like Gretzky thing; "he is the best ever and that's it".

Oh there certainly is reasonable doubt. Like I mentioned, I've considered placing Tretiak above Kharlamov before. Several of those players mentioned have strong points in their favour. The Russians almost universally regarding Kharlamov as #1 is just the factor that puts him over the top for me; it's not the beginning, middle, and end of my argument.